Oilers fall 5-3 to Rangers

Rick Nash scored with 1:21 left in the game to lift the New York Rangers to a 5-3 win over the Edmonton Oilers at Madison Square Garden.

The Oilers went up 3-2 on Adam Larsson’s first goal as an Oiler with 11:11 left. However, Jesper Fast tied it 3-3 just 42 seconds later. J.T. Miller added an empty net goal 17 seconds after Nash’s goal.

The Oilers took the initial lead on a power play goal 6:36 into the game. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins converted a kick pass from Connor McDavid for his first of the season. Kevin Hayes made it 1-1 1:58 later.

In the second period, Jesse Puljujarvi fed Patrick Maroon on a two-on-one. Maroon went cross-crease to score his third of the season. Once again, the Rangers replied, with Michael Grabner scoring his sixth of the year just over five minutes later.

Cam Talbot took the loss in net, making 26 saves.

“I thought once we got that third one (goal), that we were going to take over there and close it out, but they’re a resilient team and we knew that; and we gave them to many opportunities in front of our net and they made us pay,” remarked Talbot.

“The first one was one that we’d obviously like to have back as a team, it was not a good one to give up,” explained Oilers head coach Todd McLellan. “The second one: give them — the third one we’ve got to support that spot a lot better and we’ve got to get the puck out. And then, obviously, the last one we talked about earlier, the net play on that has to get much better than it was.”

The Oilers are winless in three (0-2-1) and fall to 7-3-1 on the season. They’ll visit the New York Islanders on Saturday. (jrw)